It Hurts
by Luthien Potter
Summary: SPOILER WARNING BOOK 5! DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVEN'T READ OotP! 1-shot. We know someone dies in OotP. Now we watch as 1 man gives the one eulogy that he had hoped against hope that he would not be called on to deliver.


I am in total shock. This is the result of that shock.  
  
This hold major OotP spoilers. You have been warned.  
  
They do not belong to me.  
  
This is a very somber Remus POV as he gives the one eulogy that he had hoped against hope that he would not be called on to deliver.  
  
It's okay, you can cry while you read it. Hell, I got teary as I wrote it. But that's okay, because Rowling said she cried while she was writing her death scene. So we can all cry together. It's better than crying alone, yes?  
  
On with the story.  
  
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It hurts.  
  
It hurts to have to give yet another eulogy. Sirius should have given the one for James and Lily Potter, but instead I gave it as Sirius was shipped off to Azkaban Prison. I gave the eulogy at the memorial service for Peter, but that doesn't really count. He's still out there, alive and helping an evil man. And now I must give the eulogy of the one person that remained of my past. The one person who knew me inside and out, all my feelings, my moods-everything.  
  
Sirius is gone.  
  
It hurts.  
  
I stand, rim rod straight behind the podium, looking out over the congregation in the small church. There aren't many people. After all, Sirius never has been officially cleared of his crimes. Most of the members of the order are here, though. Arabella Figg, crying on Mundungus Fletcher's shoulder. Nymphadora Tonks, her hair a shoulder-length somber black today, is sitting on the other side of Arabella, rubbing her back and trying herself not to break into tears. Minerva McGonagall, very white, sitting rigidly next to Albus Dumbledore. Neville Longbottom and his grandmother, sitting in the back. Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, their hands clasped between them, both with silent tears running down their faces. The rest of the Weasleys all around them: Arthur and Molly, their lips pressed together as if that can keep their bodies from flying apart. Bill and Charlie, leaning against each other as if to keep from sliding out of their seats. And Fred and George, trying to console the inconsolable Ginny that sits between them. Percy is a noticeable and noted absence. Yet, absorbed as they are in their own grief, the Weasleys had grouped around the one that the grief had hit hardest, the one person that I am most worried about, body, soul, and mind  
  
We managed to gain permission to take Harry Potter away from his aunt and uncle for one day, to attend Sirius' memorial. Harry sits in the front pew of the small church, his hands in fists on his lap. He has not spoken one word to anyone; I doubt that he's spoken a word since leaving us all at Platform 9 ¾ at the beginning of the summer, though he has been sending regular owls to say he's been treated well. I can't dispute that, his clothes fit him this year, at least. Harry looks thinner than usual, though, thinner even than Ron and Hermione had described him looking when he was eleven years old and beginning his first year at Hogwarts school. This leads me to believe that even though he may have food offered to him this summer, which would be a first, he is not eating it.  
  
And it hurts even more to see Harry like this.  
  
As my eyes finished their perusal of the small church, I begin at last to speak. I haven't written his eulogy down beforehand, as I did for James and Lily and Peter. There is no way I could put these feelings onto paper. I just let them pour out of my mouth, hoping that my brain will put the right words within reach.  
  
"I had hoped that I would never have to give another one of these speeches. I have given too many of them already. And yet, here I am, back at the podium, expected to give another eulogy. And for this one, I haven't even a piece of a body to direct it to."  
  
I look sadly at the empty coffin. I remember, when I spoke for Peter, that I had at least had a piece of the 'body', a finger. But Sirius fell behind a veil. Nobody knew what it did, it didn't even have a name. All anyone knows is that if you so much as touch this veil, you disappear, never to return. That's why it is in the Department of Mysteries in the Ministry. It wasn't the spell that had done Sirius in. No, that would have just stunned him, it wasn't a killing spell. It was the veil.  
  
I take another deep breath, willing myself to keep speaking.  
  
"Sirius Black was one of the best men I ever had the pleasure to know. Yes, the world thought he was a criminal, and I cannot deny that they had good cause. He was well set up. But Sirius was also the only man I could think of that, even with the Dementor's Kiss waiting for him, would place himself in immediate danger of a horrible punishment just to help his godson."  
  
At the mention of Harry, the one in question looks up. While everyone else is either misty eyed or already crying, Harry's eyes are dry. I am not even sure if Harry is capable of crying anymore. All his eyes hold is pain. Pain and incredible anger. And it frightens me. A fifteen year old boy should never have to see such things as he has.  
  
"I honestly do not know what I can say to convey my sadness at the loss that we have all suffered. But Sirius was not 'lost' to us. No, he was taken from us. And my feelings are not limited to sadness. I feel rage that his own cousin would try to take his life. I feel the emptiness that his absence has left. I feel the need to avenge his death, and the death of so many others." I stop to collect myself. "This is a curse, this watching the ones I love die, and being able to do nothing. We all feel this curse, some more keenly than others." I look again at Harry, who is still staring back at me with his pain and anger filled stare. He blames himself. We all do. We all think, 'If I had been that little bit faster, he would have lived.'  
  
But we are wrong. Wrong because the Dark Lord wanted someone close to Harry to die. And Sirius was his choice.  
  
Oh, I know that the vision Harry suffered was not true. Sirius had been, at that point, enjoying his supper with the rest of us at the Black House. But as soon as we entered the ministry, we knew that we might not all make it out.  
  
Why it had to be Sirius is still a mystery to me. It always will be.  
  
It is time to wrap up this eulogy. It will be short, but I hope it will suffice. Sirius never liked to sit through long lectures, anyway. I am sure his soul will be happy to flee from this somber atmosphere.  
  
"We all knew and loved Sirius. He knew and loved all of us. His collegues, and his friends. But most of all, he loved those he considered to be his family." At this, I look Harry straight in the eye, down to the depths of the pain and anger, to the depths of the eyes the same shade of green as his mothers'. "There weren't many of those. Ad a love that powerful does not fade. It lingers. And that is what will help us to beat Sirius' murderers. They think that they did themselves a favor, and that we will be too grief stricken to fight back.  
  
"They are wrong.  
  
"They have united us into a force that is to be reckoned with. And we will be victorious.  
  
"Because Sirius would have wanted it that way."  
  
The pain is still in Harry's eyes. So is the anger. But so is a spark that I watched come to life with my last words. It is determination.  
  
As I step down from the podium, Harry rises from his seat. He steps up to me, still holding my gaze. And utters the only two words that he will speak this day.  
  
"Thank you."  
  
And it hurts.  
  
~fin~ 


End file.
